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The Great Mummy Conversion of 2008

Part 1 of 3

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The quick way to get a trapezoidal flat quilt out of a mummy bag is to sew across the hood where you want the edge of the quilt to be, cut off the hood (down everywhere, so be prepared) and do the same for the footbox.
Since I am certifiable (according to people who know me well) I had to do it the hard way since I have plans to make a dog bed out of some of the leftover pieces of this mummy. Maybe this will keep my dog from trying to hog my down bag when camping. Fat chance! Or I might make myself a nice down pillow.

This is what I did.

Removed the drawstring casing from the top of the bag. (I just cut it off and used most of it later to bind raw edges).

First attached pic of hood pre-removal. Arrow is the baffle seam I chose to cut next to.

Pinned the heck out of the bag just below the baffle between the hood and the bag. The goal was to keep most of the feathers in the sleeping bag side and keep the interior baffle out of the way of the pins. It worked best for me to pinch the seams of the baffle on the inside and the outside of the bag, pull the baffle tight, and use a couple of fingers to push the baffle out of the way toward the hood. Then pin the inside and outside of the bag together just shy of the baffle seams on the bag side of the seams.

Carefully cut the hood off. I have sharp scissors and, by keeping the fabric taut while I cut, I could just glide the scissors through the shell of the bag. I turned the whole thing over, and cut the other side.

I was tired of trying to find the baffle through layers of down and ripstop, so for the short section of bag just before the foot box I pinned the layers together, trying (and mostly failing but it didn't really matter) to keep the seams on the inside and outside of the bag aligned. I did not, however, manage to keep the baffle separating the foot box from the body of the bag clear of my stitching. Oops.

Second pic: the baffle seams pinned together before stitching along each side of the seam.

I sewed along both sides of the seam and then just cut it apart. Not much down escaped, so if it is not important to you to keep the baffle structure intact in the parts you remove, you could do the same 'sew two parallel lines and cut between' method for the hood section as well. The footbox I am not so sure that'd work since the inside of the box is smaller then the outside to allow the down to loft.

If I did not want to save the footbox for the dogbed project, I'd just vacuum the down out of the footbox and cut it off, leaving the baffle attached to the bag and then sewing the edge shut. Because of the difference in diameter between the inside and outside of the bag, I had to pleat the outside layer as I went. Keeping the baffle free of my pins was not as easy as for the hood section. Cutting the footbox out was a very slow process.

Third pic: A horrifying image of a half-slaughtered sleeping bag! (the foot box removed from the outside layer of the bag)

My original plan was to try to get the down out one baffle next to the side seam of the bag, cut the bag apart, flip one side of the bag right over, resew the baffles, and then refill with the down, giving me a rectangular shape. Ha ha ha. There are limits to even my madness!

I've cut the zippers off and am considering removing the draft stopper (for the zipper) as well.

For now I'm going to finish the bottom edge of the quilt, leaving it trapezoidal, and go ahead and start working on the attachment system.

Pic: the quilt so far. I bound the footbox edge with some leftover Epic.

The weight of the quilt so far (w/out any attachment stuff) is: 3 pounds on the nose. (1.37 kg)
It is bit heavier than I like but I'll probably be plenty warm.

Well, at the moment it has grosgrain loops at all four corners; I'll loop shockcord through them and attach to the hammock suspension. I have added a drawstring channel at both end (actually the binding at the footend was already wide enough for drawstring) so I can add some shape to the quilt and adjust how it fits the curve of the hammock.

This method worked well with the lighter rectangular UQ I faked up out of a Jardine style quilt I'd made last year (removed foot box, gather channels at the end and hung by shockcords). I am not sure this method will work with the heavier mummy.

I hope to get out camping in mid November to try out all my newly-made stuff and I'll head back out to the local state rec area on a cold day in the meantime for an afternoon of hanging to get a preliminary idea (no trees for hanging 'round here).

new question to an old post but what would you say the UQ weighs roughly after removing all the excess? I have an old REI down bag I plan on doing the same or similar conversion to my bag has no hood though and has a full zip and allows me to open allthe way and lay it flat to use as a quilt if need( should make the conversion a tad easier)

new question to an old post but what would you say the UQ weighs roughly after removing all the excess? I have an old REI down bag I plan on doing the same or similar conversion to my bag has no hood though and has a full zip and allows me to open allthe way and lay it flat to use as a quilt if need( should make the conversion a tad easier)

~thanks

Well, the mummy in question has since been converted yet again into a dog bed (yes, my dog is spoiled) but I'll tell you this old bag was a heavy beast. I'll take a wild guess and say it weighed twice what a modern purpose-made down underquilt would.